Don, your 727 will be on the high end of that scale compared to the a833 in my D150, although the torque converter in an auto will help the initial roll out.

The power in my D150 after the rebuild is a substantial improvement over stock. Although it will never be confused with a drag race car, it does, easily accelerate to highway speeds and keep up with normal traffic flow. It would barely do that in stock engine trim.

If you want more power:
1) increase the compression, that will likely require premium fuel
2) go to an Offy intake manifold and a 4 bbl.
3) bump the cam size up,, more duration will push the peak power up higher in the power band and can cut power at lower RPM's so be careful.
4) pursue your turbo option. If going turbo, you should get in touch with Charlie Schmidt. Lou and others have a lot of turbo experience and will also be a good resource. Charlie has mentioned that he is considering a small turbo on a slant six in a D150 series truck to give a 'boost' when towing. Charlie may have some good ideas thought out that will apply to your goal.

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Doo Ron Ron and the Duke of Earl are friends of mine.....
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uX8Nj8ABEI8

You have some good parts on hand. I'm assuming the budget is tight as you mention buying parts as deals come around. Having built a few of these I want to share the things I won't go without in the future; in no particular order: A camshaft with the right valve timing and adequate lift installed at the correct intake centerline. Adequate dynamic compression. An electronic distributor with the proper mechanical and vacuum advance curves. A very good muffler and 2 1/4" exhaust piping. Heated intake manifold and cold air to the carburetor. Wideband O2 sensor for optimizing the fuel metering.

My '74 D100 Club Cab was a slug. It was slow with the 3-speed manual and with the 727 I swapped in. If I had it back I would get rid of the 30x10.5LT15 tires it had for 235/75R15 or 235/70R16, lower it 2", re-curve the distributor, check for exhaust backpressure and check intake vacuum at full-load RPM. This would probably follow with me tossing the 1945 Holley 1 bbl for a 2 bbl. Not good enough? I'd check the valve timing with my degree wheel and dial indicator and advance the cam as needed. If it was still too slow I'd pull the head and check the compression ratio. Then I would start making plans for the new cam and ported and milled head. I would probably toss the 12" torque converter for an 11" like the A904 used to get the truck off the line better.

I really wish there were available a progressive (staged) 2 bbl of adequate flow like the Holley 2305 of yesteryear. The Weber 32/36 is better than a 1 bbl and about the same air flow as the Super Six BBD, but far short of a big 2 bbl or 390 Holley 4 bbl in terms of flow. If your BBD is in good shape I'd work with that first.

SI Valves still have the 1.70/1.44" valves cataloged. If they don't have them on hand you can use early, non-rail ('63-'65), 289 valves which are 1.78/1.45". The intake will fit a .030" or larger overbore, but it better in a +.060" bore. The only thing is you need new keepers for the smaller stems. Your head probably already needs guides and the size change doesn't make them cost any more.

P.S. If you want to plan for a turbo you'd better plan for a second cylinder head with larger chambers. A good dynamic compression ratio on your naturally aspirated engine will be too high for a turbo engine. Conversely the right compression ratio for a turbo engine will cost power and economy on the naturally aspirated engine. Water-alcohol injection on a low boost turbo would be a fair work around. Intercooling is a must have above ~5 psi in my estimation.

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Joshua

good feedback here guys....
John, what you describe your truck as being able to do "now" vs "before," sounds very much what I have in mind for mine to be able to do.
I have had a couple of /6 trucks over the years before this one. My son also has a /6 truck. I know how they "are" in stock form, and in the past I have done the "318 thing" on 1 of them..... I know that I can get "enough" out of a /6 for what I want/need and I want to up the power "unconventionally" by keeping the slant. I have never had a /6/727 combo myself, I have had 727s behind other engines, I know you guys love the 904s, but my experience with them is that they are under built junk. They do not last for me. I have swapped 727s in place of 904s in several of my past vehicles.
That's why I want to keep the 727 in this truck, especially with a power increase.
I have swapped 3 speed manuals for A833OD's before,
have also swapped an NV 3500 into my 1st (of 3 so far) 318 Magnum, Club Cab Dakota.
IF I swap anything in in place of the 727, it would be a 4 or 5 speed stick, but "not now". if this truck stays auto, it will stay 727.
I know, the 727 will absorb more of the engine's output, whatever that engine in front of it may be. I haven't had the starter out yet to see in there, as to whether it is a 11 or a 12" converter.
So far, all I have done to it, is to get the original engine running, as I bought it non running. I will tell what all that is involving, later. I hope to drive it "as is" for a while once I get the "PO's bugs" out of it, mainly undoing their electrical handiwork, and then replace the rotten cracked tires, while I gather goodies for this engine...… I do have some bodywork that needs to happen, more "panel straightening" than rust repair. and a paint job.

While I am not trying to necessarily "go cheap", I want this done right/ I hate redo's, I only want to do this job once. Not cheap, not "spend lots so I can brag about how much I spent", the best way to put it is "bang for the buck". That, and searches coming up with 19 pages (on average) each of replies that vary from "way off base" to "close but not quite" to wade thru is why I started this thread. This isn't going to be a drag racer, or Lemons road course competitor but it seems that most search results I find are geared those directions..... I guess that the ""Lemons" would be closer to what I am after, in that I want this build to last a LONG time.

For longevity at the expected horsepower level the important things are good air filtration, reasonable oil change intervals and a properly functioning carburetor/choke to avoid washing the lubrication off the cylinder walls. Keep the valves adjusted and you'll do fine for a very long time.

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Joshua

Don if you are ever down this way or I am around your area you can take the D150 for a test drive,,

and back on the torque / hp dyno test. I did that not long after I had got the D150 together. The truck had what I describe as a 'soft spot' in the acceleration between 2200 and 2400 RPM.
It did not bog or hesitate, it just felt like the rate of acceleration slowed to a lower rate. I swapped out the springs in the distributor to bring the advance in earlier and that lag in power was eliminated. It feels very linear in acceleration. That section on the chart is a good visual of the effect of the wrong advance curve.

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Doo Ron Ron and the Duke of Earl are friends of mine.....
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uX8Nj8ABEI8

Well I have been accused of "overdoing"maintenance over the years

looking at these slant heads I have sitting here, been looking around here a bit, I hear a lot of comments about using smallblock springs.... looking around elsewhere (Rock auto and other parts sources) looks like the "318 springs" talked about being used are actually very much the same as stock slant ones?

Originally (as built) the slant used a somewhat lighter load valve spring than was used on the 318. The original springs were superseded by the standard 318 spring. So this replacement is an upgrade over the factory valve spring. If you need higher load springs then you get into 340 springs with the damper, but those should have a larger retainer so the budget goes up. Don't get the HD 318 exhaust valve spring as it's meant for a valve rotator and is too short.

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Joshua

yup I have seen those damper-springs.

Well slowly coming together. Got my NOS valves via Ebay, got my 318 springs via FABO, and my rods from a member here, not sure if he wants me saying who, but they're NOS! for a "too good to say no" price. He also sent me some O/S valves, I forgot the numbers, but they look like they might have a couple of hours on them if that... I think that I'd have to go 60-over to use them whether or not the block needs it to be brought back within tolerance.
But I have plenty of time to scope that out.....

for a truck motor, (not a "race truck," but more of a 3 season daily driver that may sometimes get "used as a truck") would the 318 springs be OK with a 819 cam or a Delta 264S? it appears that a cam in this general area of lift/duration/overlap is what is being suggested as the "best fit for what I am wanting this thing to do"..…. I have other engines I can use those springs that I have, on, if I need to do something else in that dep't for this engine....

Yes, that should be a good valve spring for your cam choice.

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Joshua

D

ok... block and crank are at the machine shop for evaluation so I can get parts coming. I pulled the cam bearings (shot, chunks out of a couple) freeze plugs and oil galley plugs before I sent it away. Mains looked great, didn't have any rods pistons or rod bearings when I got this basket case. All crank journals looked fine, no grooving or scoring, just dirty. I also discovered that I am missing a main cap bolt...
I often look on Ebay, largely as a quick reference for various parts/ sometimes I buy there, sometimes not..... don't cost anything to look. I often find people there are nuts with asking prices, easier to tell when there's more than 1 of something listed.

in doing so, I saw someone had an ARP main stud kit available for a slant, I know that would be overkill..... but for the price, mid-$60s for the set didn't strike me as being "that bad" for what it is.... I am still on the fence, as to whether to build my engine as a turbo, or not/ if I decided that was the way to go, I'd be more inclined to go that route.
others had individual main caps NOS, listed. I don't need any, was just surprised to see something like that listed.

I know that companies (like) FelPro sell head bolt sets for popular engines..... not sure if they sell main cap bolts/ either individually or as a set/ besides these stud kits.

Never really took an inventory of what all came with or what is missing, but I know I was missing some parts from the get go. Instead at this point kinda looking at what is there as I go along.... I see pushrods and head bolts in the box but haven't yet taken a count.... was missing 1 lifter, the other 11 were still stuck in the block, took some light tapping from underneath, to free those that were still there. Those will be getting tossed and replaced anyway so no biggie.

have to get my cam sent off for regrind, what is the best way to pack and ship? I may send a carbd 360 cam along too, for something else I have...

Dadtruck, I didn't send a head off with the block and crank/ would like to talk to you further, about what we had previously discussed regarding the head.

I did make comment to the machine shop about a problem I had with the last /6 I built..... which I didn't discover a crack in the block and nether did the machine shop that did the machine work, until it was back in the car and running.....then I discovered a crack below the front freeze plug, wasn't too happy about that at the time.... but the car that engine went into had gotten totaled within 1000 miles after the engine swap, so it wound up a moot point....
but anyways I pointed that out to them since that engine, like this one, was one that I had never previously able to hear run before I did all the work to it that I had done. I don't want a repeat. they said "we only see a couple of these a year, so if theres something you know about them that we don't, let us know". They did say they would mag the whole thing before they got too deep into it, its been too many years ago since I did up that 63 block that wound up cracked that went into an Aspen/ I couldn't tell you if that block got magged back then, or not.
if I had been able to hear this current one run before finishing teardown and sending to the machine shop, I'd be less inclined to be "worried" about that step..... but with my past exp with that 63 motor, I'm glad they suggested a mag check for cracks.....

chime in guys, if not for "my" good, for the good of others that may be watching, Ive seen a couple of threads along the lines of "engine build suggestions"
since I started this one.

Speaking of engine bolts, since I happened upon a set of NOS Rods for my build, I'm not too worried about replacing the rod bolts.... since I already have new ones, by virtue of the rods being new.

They say that you need to hone the main bearing bores if you switch from main bolts to studs, so factor that into the cost. I'd probably just beg a used bolt from someone or get a new grade 8 bolt from a local hardware store. LA main bearing bolts are only slightly too long (use a couple hardened washers under the head) if you have any extra of those. It's good that you have the main caps. My dearly departed machinist friend went through 4 or 5 rear main caps to find one close enough for the 340 he wanted to save.

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Joshua